4 ms·

Money isn’t “necessary” or even “real” in a physical sense. Absolutely everything that happened today (*) could have happened exactly the same way if money didn

by wrs 2y ago

Money isn’t “necessary” or even “real” in a physical sense. Absolutely everything that happened today (*) could have happened exactly the same way if money didn’t exist. The only thing money does is affect what people decide to do. It’s the distributed control plane for society. And as yet, nobody has invented a better control plane that scales. (*) Ignoring things that happened with money directly, of course, like the financial “industry”.

bluGill 2y ago
Most things could not happen without money. I have no use for the million dollar gadget I make. After 5-10 years on my job I would earn just one - but I need to eat every day not wait until I have earned one machine which then I have to find the person who needs it and trade for whatever they make with it (which they would have to give me all at once even though the gadget should work for years), and then trade those things around until finally I find someone who can give me some food... Money is a necessary tool to make modern life possible. Other ways of life are possible, but not my current one.
- rbanffy 2y ago
  > but I need to eat every day not wait until What if you just went to the grocery store and got what you need, without paying money in return? What if everybody continued doing what they do, except that no payment took place? People would deliver groceries from the farm to the market, would write software for ensuring the right deliveries get where they are needed, and so on. Bank clerks would probably not have much to do, but, if they wanted, they could still go to the bank and play cards with their colleagues. Wouldn't that be a better world? > Money is a necessary tool to make modern life possible. It's so because we seem to have, as a society, it is.
  - bluGill 2y ago
    > Wouldn't that be a better world? Only if your world is small enough that you can trust nobody is cheating. If everybody is doing their share to ensure there is always food in the store it works great. If only a few people are cheating it still works well enough. (I'm going to include the disabled in the cheating category for this discussion, because this is complex enough without trying to fit everything into the mold). As your world gets larger eventually more and more people start to realize that they can get by without working until there is no food in the store for anyone. Note that getting food includes not just the easy stuff, but the gross stuff. If you can trust the store has what you need, you need some way to incentivize someone to get rid of the trash anyway. Money provides a good abstraction for some jobs being worth more - nearly anyone can haul trash to the dump, but because of the "gross factor" it pays more than other jobs that nearly anyone can do. Very few people can pass medical or engineering school - it is known as a hard study for good reason, so we incentivize people to go that route with more pay, if you can get everything you need, does your society have the right incentives to ensure it gets better? History is full of societies that work similar to what you say. They all have their own ways of dealing with the above problems. One thing they all have in common is most people only contact a limited number of people and so they can crack down on cheaters because they learn who they are and so reputation matters. (the few travelers paid for their food via stories or barter, and often were looked down on anyway. Or often travelers were military and just took by force) Again, money makes modern society possible and everyone who proposes otherwise normally just handwaves away real problems with their proposal. A few are willing to accept that downside, but when I look at those downsides I conclude I'm not and I think most will agree once they understand them.
    - rbanffy 2y ago
      > Only if your world is small enough that you can trust nobody is cheating. If everyone has everything they need, is this a problem?
      - bluGill 2y ago
        Your post scarcity world doesn't exist.
        rbanffy 2y ago
        Maybe. Global food production seems sufficient for everyone. Most humans are surviving, even if distribution is uneven, so, if we fix that, everything should work out.
      - Izkata 2y ago
        "Need" and "want" are two very different things. Just a few years ago people were hoarding toilet paper, and that's with money as a factor limiting how much they could get at once. Sometimes there are no limits to "want".
        rbanffy 2y ago
        But what if people, being sure they’d always get what they need, just didn’t engage in hoarding. And, those who still did, as many people do, got help to deal with their insecurities?
- wrs 2y ago
  Things would not happen the same way without money. I’m saying there’s no reason they could not happen (again, ignoring operations on money itself). The function of money is simply to help humans collectively decide what happens, of all the things that could happen. And I’m not arguing against the existence of money at all — it’s an incredibly useful control mechanism. It’s not the only one, of course, we also have social norms (aka peer pressure), altruism, threats of violence, laws enforced by threats of violence, etc. etc. (Much evil and stupidity is perpetrated by people who seem to believe money is the only control mechanism that should matter.)
  - bluGill 2y ago
    > (Much evil and stupidity is perpetrated by people who seem to believe money is the only control mechanism that should matter.) Much evil and stupidity is perpetrated by people who believe the strawman idea that some think money is the only control mechanism that should matter.
Aloisius 2y ago
Exactly the same way? If you make plows and want milk from a dairy farmer with a limited supply of milk who does not need or want any more plows, how do you get milk the same way as today without the concept of money?
- wrs 2y ago
  The physical processes of making plows and delivering milk do not involve money in any way. The only role money plays here is to influence the farmer to decide to give you milk.
  - Aloisius 2y ago
    So it facilitates exchange between people who would not otherwise trade. Thus things would be different absent money and given the long complex supply chains required to make most things today, like say plows, it is hard to argue things wouldn't be significantly different.

by wrs 2y ago

bluGill 2y ago

Most things could not happen without money. I have no use for the million dollar gadget I make. After 5-10 years on my job I would earn just one - but I need to eat every day not wait until I have earned one machine which then I have to find the person who needs it and trade for whatever they make with it (which they would have to give me all at once even though the gadget should work for years), and then trade those things around until finally I find someone who can give me some food... Money is a necessary tool to make modern life possible. Other ways of life are possible, but not my current one.

rbanffy 2y ago
> but I need to eat every day not wait until What if you just went to the grocery store and got what you need, without paying money in return? What if everybody continued doing what they do, except that no payment took place? People would deliver groceries from the farm to the market, would write software for ensuring the right deliveries get where they are needed, and so on. Bank clerks would probably not have much to do, but, if they wanted, they could still go to the bank and play cards with their colleagues. Wouldn't that be a better world? > Money is a necessary tool to make modern life possible. It's so because we seem to have, as a society, it is.
- bluGill 2y ago
  > Wouldn't that be a better world? Only if your world is small enough that you can trust nobody is cheating. If everybody is doing their share to ensure there is always food in the store it works great. If only a few people are cheating it still works well enough. (I'm going to include the disabled in the cheating category for this discussion, because this is complex enough without trying to fit everything into the mold). As your world gets larger eventually more and more people start to realize that they can get by without working until there is no food in the store for anyone. Note that getting food includes not just the easy stuff, but the gross stuff. If you can trust the store has what you need, you need some way to incentivize someone to get rid of the trash anyway. Money provides a good abstraction for some jobs being worth more - nearly anyone can haul trash to the dump, but because of the "gross factor" it pays more than other jobs that nearly anyone can do. Very few people can pass medical or engineering school - it is known as a hard study for good reason, so we incentivize people to go that route with more pay, if you can get everything you need, does your society have the right incentives to ensure it gets better? History is full of societies that work similar to what you say. They all have their own ways of dealing with the above problems. One thing they all have in common is most people only contact a limited number of people and so they can crack down on cheaters because they learn who they are and so reputation matters. (the few travelers paid for their food via stories or barter, and often were looked down on anyway. Or often travelers were military and just took by force) Again, money makes modern society possible and everyone who proposes otherwise normally just handwaves away real problems with their proposal. A few are willing to accept that downside, but when I look at those downsides I conclude I'm not and I think most will agree once they understand them.
  - rbanffy 2y ago
    > Only if your world is small enough that you can trust nobody is cheating. If everyone has everything they need, is this a problem?
    - bluGill 2y ago
      Your post scarcity world doesn't exist.
      - rbanffy 2y ago
        Maybe. Global food production seems sufficient for everyone. Most humans are surviving, even if distribution is uneven, so, if we fix that, everything should work out.
    - Izkata 2y ago
      "Need" and "want" are two very different things. Just a few years ago people were hoarding toilet paper, and that's with money as a factor limiting how much they could get at once. Sometimes there are no limits to "want".
      - rbanffy 2y ago
        But what if people, being sure they’d always get what they need, just didn’t engage in hoarding. And, those who still did, as many people do, got help to deal with their insecurities?
wrs 2y ago
Things would not happen the same way without money. I’m saying there’s no reason they could not happen (again, ignoring operations on money itself). The function of money is simply to help humans collectively decide what happens, of all the things that could happen. And I’m not arguing against the existence of money at all — it’s an incredibly useful control mechanism. It’s not the only one, of course, we also have social norms (aka peer pressure), altruism, threats of violence, laws enforced by threats of violence, etc. etc. (Much evil and stupidity is perpetrated by people who seem to believe money is the only control mechanism that should matter.)
- bluGill 2y ago
  > (Much evil and stupidity is perpetrated by people who seem to believe money is the only control mechanism that should matter.) Much evil and stupidity is perpetrated by people who believe the strawman idea that some think money is the only control mechanism that should matter.

Aloisius 2y ago

Exactly the same way? If you make plows and want milk from a dairy farmer with a limited supply of milk who does not need or want any more plows, how do you get milk the same way as today without the concept of money?

wrs 2y ago
The physical processes of making plows and delivering milk do not involve money in any way. The only role money plays here is to influence the farmer to decide to give you milk.
- Aloisius 2y ago
  So it facilitates exchange between people who would not otherwise trade. Thus things would be different absent money and given the long complex supply chains required to make most things today, like say plows, it is hard to argue things wouldn't be significantly different.